


Exit Strategy

by DesireeArmfeldt



Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Gift Fic, M/M, My First Work in This Fandom, POV Third Person Limited, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-11
Updated: 2017-07-11
Packaged: 2018-11-16 01:49:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,112
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11243832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DesireeArmfeldt/pseuds/DesireeArmfeldt
Summary: Series finale fix-it fic.





	Exit Strategy

**Author's Note:**

  * For [jedibuttercup](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jedibuttercup/gifts).



> Note: I am sad that I didn’t have time to pursue your steampunk!POI idea, because now I'd really like to read some. Hopefully someone else will write some, one of these days!
> 
> Note: a bunch of the dialogue is quoted verbatim from the Season 5 finale.

The wind strikes Harold a body-blow as he stumbles out onto the rooftop. It stings his nose and cheeks; makes his eyes water. Cold. He didn’t expect it to be so cold up here. Or maybe that’s shock setting in. That’s one of the symptoms of shock, isn’t it? Feeling cold? He knows this, but he can’t call the details to mind just now.

It hurts less than he’d imagined, a gunshot wound to the abdomen. That’s probably also an effect of the shock. Or the adrenaline of his current situation. Or one of the body’s myriad other mechanisms to keep from being overwhelmed by its own pain signals. He should be lying down—quite possibly, he should be gasping his last—but instead, here he is, placing one stumbling foot in front of the other, over and over. Staggering across Times Square, into a lobby, an elevator, a short stair marked _Authorized Access Only,_ and out into the wind. His feet crunch unevenly over the gravel. All around him, the grey sky brightens into a smudgy sunrise.

He finds it cheers him: the thought that he will die outdoors, surrounded by sky if not otherwise by nature. He’s very much an indoor creature, but the wind on his face recalls his rural childhood. And it’s fitting, he supposes, for a bird to die in the air.

Not for the first time, though almost certainly for the last, he wonders about the Machine’s sense of humor.

The final minutes of his life take on a surreal quality as he huddles against the chilly cement wall, clinging to his wavering consciousness—because it would be a bitter, final irony, wouldn’t it, if life as humanity knew it ended because he passed out mere moments before the time came for him to save it? The Machine speaks to him, using not only Root’s voice but her face and form, now, as well. Which, unless she’s suddenly invented hologram technology to rival _Star Trek_ ’s, is as good a sign as any that Harold’s grasp on reality has become tenuous.

They banter about mortality. He banters, anyway; she doesn’t rise to his attempts at humor. She seems to be in a melancholy frame of mind, which he supposes is only fair, although given that she’s the one about to be heroically brought back from the brink, while he. . .well, a little more comfort in his last moments doesn’t seem like too much to ask. But then, he didn’t design her to provide comfort. And he did choose this fate for himself.

Still, that doesn’t mean he’s _looking forward_ to dying alone.

He asks her what’s become of his friends—except for John, he knows all too well where John is. Safe underground, raging at Harold for saving him once and for all. Safe: that’s the important thing. Harold can face dying as long as John is safe, and the Machine. Living on after him. He will never have children—has never wanted them—but this must be how parents feel about their children. _I would willingly die to give you a long and happy life._ Yes. The Machine, his child. And John. His. . .no, his partner still, no matter what Harold told him earlier, because no divorce, no death can pry John out of his place in Harold’s heart.

He’s getting rather maudlin, it seems. A little-publicized side effect of shock? He’ll have to ask John. . .but of course, he’ll never have the opportunity to ask John anything again.

The Machine doesn’t know what’s become of the others. Or so she says. Instead, she keeps trying to tell him about her epiphany, only apparently she’s forgotten it. He feels sorry for her, crippled and dying. Like him. Hopefully when he’s uploaded her and she regains herself, she’ll remember whatever it is she’s been trying to tell him. He won’t be there to hear it, of course. It’s too bad. He could use some comforting philosophy, alone on this windy rooftop in the final minutes of his life. But all she can give him is “everyone dies alone.” Which is true enough, and he’s prepared, he’s content, but he’s shivering cold and he wishes John were here to hold his hand. . .

Her voice chases him as he drifts through time and space, unmoored. . . .

. . . . _Is it now?. . ._

. . . .now he’s a child, absorbing everything his father can tell him about birds, not yet knowing that all this knowledge was learned for his own sake; trusting unconditionally in his father’s love and wisdom, not yet understanding how rare a gift they are. . . .

. . . .now Grace pledges that her love can withstand his secrets. This time, he recognizes the gift for what it is, and he aches with gratitude and the knowledge that he can’t accept it. . . .

. . . .now John kneels on the Library floor to accept Bear’s exuberant welcome. Rikers and bomb vests both behind him, he ruffles the dog’s ears, every line of his own body loose and playful despite the bruises—

—(Bear. . .where is Bear? Is someone taking care of him? They couldn’t bring a dog along to break into the Federal Reserve, but Ms Shaw and Detective Fusco. . .For a vivid moment, he sees Bear trapped alone in the abandoned subway station, waiting for his humans to return, waiting, and waiting. . .But no, Bear will be all right. John will see to that.) —

—Harold feasts his eyes on John, free and unbroken and _here—_ and then John raises his head to favor Harold with a delighted grin—and Harold’s heart cries out hopelessly, but no less definitively for that, _Yes! Please! Mine! . . ._

“Two minutes, Harold,” says the Machine in Root’s voice. Apologetic, but firm.

Harold levers himself away from the electrical box he’s been leaning on. On his two feet, he stumbles forward, eyes on the satellite dishes that loom overhead.

“The building’s been evacuated?” he asks. Which is the one he needs to. . .not that one. . .nor that one, it couldn’t possibly have the range. . .

“Yes,” she confirms. That’s all right, then. Samaritan won’t claim any more innocent lives along with Harold’s. Not here, at least. “We have one minute ‘till the satellite’s in range, Harry, and then three more minutes until—”

“Until it’s all over. Did you remember your little pearl of wisdom?” he asks absently. No, that one can’t be the right dish, either. Where is it?

“No,” she sighs. “All these memories, getting lost in them. . .”

“Wait, are you sure this is the right place?” he interrupts.

“Yes,” she says, like a mother reassuring her child. (She’s never had a child, either. Neither the Machine nor Root. Does the Machine understand parenthood the way she claims to understand death?) “This is where you’re supposed to be.”

“No, none of these dishes are capable of transmitting to a Molniya orbit,” he protests with absolute, panicked certainty. She made a mistake; with her failing capacity, some glitch, some hitch, she guided him here, and now it will all have been for nothing. “This is the wrong building!”

Suddenly, in his ear: “Right building, Finch. For you.”

That soft voice, unmistakable. Impossible.

Harold’s body turns without conscious intent as his mind dumps core, his eyes scanning the nearby rooftops, homing in on telemetry, satellite dish—

“John,” he breathes. Above the safety-wall, like a yeoman guarding a castle, John’s head and shoulders are silhouetted against the hazy glow of the overcast sky. “What are you doing?”

“Me and the machine have had a long-standing arrangement. A deal.” At this distance, John’s face is little more than a blur, but his quiet, level voice is as clear as if he were standing at Harold’s side. His head turns, looking over his shoulder at the satellite dish. The one capable of. . .

Harold tears his eyes away to focus on the case in his hand. Stuffs the gun in his pocket to free his hand. Fumbles the catches open. The lid swings free, confirming what he already knows: it’s empty.

The case falls from his hand as he turns back to see John raise an identical case, like the punchline of a conjuring trick.

“Told you. Pay you back all at once.” Harold can hear him smiling. Smug. Fond. Implacable. “That’s the way I like it.”

Unbearable.

“No, I told you,” Harold protests like a child in the face of the inevitable, as John snaps open his case and begins to type. “It’s supposed to be me. Alone.”

“Sorry Harry, a deal’s a deal,” says the Machine. “You know as well as I do that he wasn’t going to let you die.”

“You should get moving Harold,” John says. Above him, the dish begins to rotate. “It’s gonna get a little exciting up here.”

The dish locks into position. John’s facing Harold again, no longer typing. He must have finished the setup. But he isn’t moving. He’s just looking down at Harold like he has all the time in the world.

He doesn’t have any time left. Harold knows this. If there had been any chance that someone could upload the Machine and make it off the roof, she would have told him so, and they would have planned something better than a suicide mission. Still, there is no such thing as complete data or a perfect model. A practical impossibility is not the same as a probability of 0.

“All right, you’ve done it,” he urges, unable to simply let this happen, even now. “Now let the upload take care of itself and get out of there now.”

“Behind you, John,” warns the Machine in Root’s all-business voice.

John pivots and fires three shots at something Harold can’t see from this angle.

“Two more,” she says, and this time, Harold sees the two black-clad figures just before John drops them. There’s a muzzle flash of semi-automatic fire, but John doesn’t waver. His movements look casual, as though killing a pack of trained assassins is as easy as tying a shoe. But then, John always did make it all look easy.

“More on the way.” The Machine’s tone is still as maddeningly calm as ever. Harold ignores her. This is no longer about her.

“Mr. Reese?” He tries for a firm, commanding tone, though he’s shaking to pieces. “John. We’ve been through this before. I won’t leave this roof without you.”

It’s a dirty shot, but he’s desperate. And it hits home. He can hear as much in the note of desperation in John’s voice when he barks, “There’s no way to defuse the bomb this time, Harold. Get out of here!”

“You owe me your life!” Harold shouts up into the wind. “Don’t you dare throw away what’s mine!”

John’s head whips around to lock gazes with him across the gulf for a single, frozen moment.

Then the Machine cries, “John!” and John snaps back to attention in time to duck for cover as shots ring and ricochet around him, loud over the comm, echoing faintly moments later as the soundwaves cross the gulf of air to Harold’s ears.

“I’m sorry, Harry,” she says as John vanishes from sight for a moment, then reappears before Harold can do more than suck in a panicked breath. She does sound sorry. But then, Root was always a fine actress, and as for the Machine. . .

“I did the best I could for you. I wanted to give you a happy ending,” she pleads, then snaps, “On your left, John!”

As for the Machine, despite all his denials, Harold has been aware for quite some time that in addition to the free will he designed for her, she also has priorities, opinions, whims. . .and loyalties. And what more definitive declaration of personhood than to disregard one’s parent’s explicit instructions—his last wish, no less—out of (call a spade a spade) love?

A machine can only execute instructions, correctly specified by the programmer or otherwise. It takes a person to commit betrayal.

“What the hell is happy about this?” Harold cries, clutching the wall with both white-knuckled hands as muzzle flashes flare from both sides and John fires, ducks, and fires again. “All these years you’ve watched me, and you don’t know me at all?”

“I don’t remember. . .” she whispers. “My core systems are failing. . .I’m sorry.”

But Harold only has eyes for John, who is fighting with grim determination, trying to do the impossible to please Harold one more time.

He hears the impact and John’s grunt of pain; sees John jerk and stagger but keep his feet.

“John!” he shouts. The wind shreds the sound out of his mouth. It doesn’t matter. John could hear him if he whispered, as close and as far away as always.

More shots, a shout, and then a sudden silence in which Harold can hear John’s labored breath and the sound of him ramming a new clip of ammunition home.

One-handed, John hoists himself onto the ledge, his head in constant motion. Charting the territory while keeping an eye out for the next wave of gunmen. Looking for options. For a way to jump or climb without falling to his death. There isn’t one; they both—all three—know it. But John is trying his damndest, and the least and most that Harold can do for him is to watch. To root for him. To bear witness.

John is poetry in motion—an overused quotation, yes, but an apt description of the way he makes strength and skill and training look as effortless as a leaf spiraling on a breeze. Harold watches him drop like a cat to face his new assailants, then twist and pivot, the black line of his arm describing precise, deadly arcs through the air, until Harold’s view blurs with tears or dizziness or both. How much blood has he lost, he wonders muzzily, but it’s irrelevant. All that matters is that John not fall while Harold can’t even _see_ him—

“Harry!” Root’s voice sounds very far away—because the Machine is failing, or because Harold is. Probably both. With the glee of a child bursting to show off a crayon drawing, she declares, “I remember!”

“Spare me your epiphany.” He couldn’t bear to hear it now. He doesn’t begrudge her the life he gave her, the life he would have died to protect, but he can’t forgive her for what she’s done.

“No, not _that_ ,” she says. “Look!”

From behind the gleaming glass tower, something moves across the hazy sky. A speck, growing larger. A faint, familiar sound, doubled through his earbug, growing from a thrum to a battering of the air.

“What. . . ?” he mumbles through numb lips.

“Your exit strategy,” she pronounces, as the black helicopter swoops down from behind the satellite dish.

 

                                    *                      *                      *

 

He floats woozily up into consciousness and an impression of Hospital. Familiar smells, sounds.  Familiar, terrifying feeling of being trapped in a cage of pain, in a body that no longer belongs to him.  
  
_The ferry—Nathan—Grace—all those people dead—run, hide, disappear—_  
  
But no, that can’t be right.  He remembers the explosion and what happened after; hospitals and surgeries and wheelchairs, the Library and the Machine and the Numbers.  Nathan died years ago.  Just over five years.  
  
_Still time-traveling_ , he thinks with muzzy panic, and struggles to drag himself back to the present, because John is dying without him on the other rooftop and Harold needs to _be there—_  
  
But he isn’t standing on a roof in the chilly dawn.  He really, actually is lying in a hospital bed.  Cold, dry, medicinal air.  The peculiar discomfort of IV and catheter.  The slow, dizzy contentment of morphine.  All real.  But the vast pain lurking beyond the drugs isn’t in his spine, it’s in his abdomen.  This isn’t 2010, he isn’t here because of the ferry explosion, he was. . .he was. . .  
  
Shot.  He was shot, in the vault where he left John.  He was bleeding out, on the roof, watching John upload the Machine to the satellite, watching him—  
  
He wrenches his eyes open, sees a blur of white ceiling—and then John.  Sitting at his bedside.  Half-lidded eyes opening wide when he sees Harold looking at him.  John.  
  
“Hey, Harold,” he says softly, leaning over Harold and letting go of his hand, which Harold now realizes John has been holding.  John’s other arm, the one further from Harold, is in a sling, and he’s wearing a blue hospital johnny, but he’s alive and in better shape than Harold himself.  
  
Harold tries to speak, but his mouth and throat are so dry, all he can manage is a weak cough.  John takes a cup of water from the bedside table and holds it to Harold’s mouth, feeding him slow, tepid sips until Harold signals that he’s had enough.  
  
“How’re you feeling?” John asks.  
  
“Lucky to. . .be alive,” Harold whispers.  Each word is a tremendous effort; simply breathing feels akin to rolling a boulder uphill.  “Where. . . ?”  
  
“Private hospital.  Switzerland.  Logan Pierce made the arrangements.  Don’t know if you remember—”  
  
“Helicopter.”  Harold affirms.  “Exit strategy.”  
  
John frowns.  “You knew?”  
  
Harold shakes his head.  “She didn’t. . .say.”  
  
John nods, accepting the explanation, but still frowning.  Not angry with Harold for what he didn’t actually do, but that still leaves a lot of reasons for anger.  Harold steels himself to accept whatever’s coming, as a fair price for John’s life.  
  
“So. . .” John finally says, not meeting Harold’s eyes.  “What’re you gonna do with it?”  
  
“With what?”

“My life.  It’s yours, remember?”  The words are mocking but there’s no humor in John’s flat tone. 

“For God’s. . .”  Breathless with shame and outrage and the struggle to get words out at all, Harold manages, “I don’t. . . _own_ you. . . .You know. . .better.”

John shrugs, his gaze fixed on Harold’s knees.

After a long moment, he says, still with no inflection whatsoever, “So, then.  This is where our partnership ends?”

A question, not a pronouncement.  Not angry at all. 

_Oh, John._

Harold manages to move his hand far enough to pluck John’s sleeve.  When John reflexively takes Harold’s hand in his, Harold curls his fingers around John’s.

“You know. . .why I. . .said that.”

John looks down at their joined hands, then finally raises his eyes to meet Harold’s.

“Yeah.  I do.”

“Great minds. . . ?” Harold offers with a tentative suggestion of a smile.

John gives a soft snort, acknowledgement tinged with humor.

“Guess so.”

And it might have been difficult out of all proportion for John to acknowledge aloud what they both understood perfectly well on the rooftop, but now that the words have been spoken, John looks. . .settled.  Like he defies any power in the world to make him take it back.

Harold is sorely tempted to leave it there, but there’s one more thing he needs to know, even though he dreads John’s answer.

“John?” he whispers.  
  
“Yeah?”  
  
“You. . .sorry?”  
  
“For tricking you?”  
  
Harold shakes his head.    
  
“You’re not dead,” he clarifies.  
  
John blinks, then he gets it, and Harold has never seen him look so openly horrified.  He opens his mouth, shuts it, sets his jaw, and shakes his head.  Then he says, in a perfectly pleasant tone that brooks no argument, “Don’t be stupid, Harold,” and squeezes Harold’s hand.  
  
Relief floods Harold, finding expression in an undoubtedly foolish-looking smile.  John answers with his home-from-Rikers grin, and every cell in Harold’s abused, exhausted body breaks into song.  
  
“So. . .” John asks, rubbing his thumb softly over the back of Harold’s hand.  “What’s next?”  
  
“How do you feel about Italy?”

 

                                    *                      *                      *

 

The sun slanting into Harold’s eyes past the porch roof calls his attention to the time: it’s later than he’d realized.  That’s all right, though; he’s more or less finished, anyway.  Just a loose end or two to wrap up.  Energyne’s new battery will be a game-changer for renewable energy, in the long run, and the grant for the pilot project in Delhi will be the first step towards keeping the company afloat and in the news until the developed countries get more smart grid infrastructure online and can start to really take advantage of the batteries.  Other partnerships will be necessary in the interim, of course, and Harold has already started putting wheels in motion to get Energyne talking to Gridless and their recently-recruited angel donors about disseminating the technology to individual households in Central Africa, but there’s only so much he can do before Energyne goes public. 

Oh, and he really ought to drop a word in Logan Pierce’s ear about the bill coming up for vote next month in Wisconsin, and about laying the groundwork for similar bills in Arizona and West Virginia.  Unlike Harold, Pierce wields considerable financial and social capital in his own name and is therefore in a better position to directly influence policy decisions.  In theory, he doesn’t know the identity of the pseudonymous investor who has struck up a strategic alliance with him to promote the adoption and decentralization of clean energy in a number of ways. In practice, he’s no fool, and frankly, Harold hasn’t tried particularly hard to fool him.  Pierce understands the game and its stakes; plausible deniability is all that’s required, and that’s more for Harold’s peace of mind than for any practical reason.

As for Pierce’s. . .other work, Harold deliberately avoids keeping tabs on any such thing.  It wouldn’t be too difficult, even if he restrained himself to publicly-available information.  He could code up the algorithms to search for certain patterns in D.C. local news stories and police logs, stock market fluctuations, political and financial blogs. . .but he doesn’t.  Just as he doesn’t attempt to figure out how many teams are out there now, doing the Machine’s work.  It’s no longer his business.

He does bend his own rules to the extent of monitoring the _New York Times_ and the NYPD’s website to assure himself that Detective Fusco remains alive and employed.  Similarly, Taylor Carter’s Friendczar page and Twitter feed afford Harold some reassurance about the young man’s well-being.  (The discreet augmentation of Detective Carter’s pension fund involves trivial maintenance on Harold’s part, and is the least he owes her memory.  The full scholarship to NYU, however, was entirely Taylor’s own doing.  Not that Harold wouldn’t have interfered on his behalf, but it wasn’t necessary.)

But that’s where he stops.  It isn’t as difficult as he’d imagined it would be, actually.  He has his projects, and his life here with John, and he feels surprisingly fulfilled.  And as for the occasional itch of curiosity about. . .absent friends, well, he reminds himself that curiosity may or may not kill the cat, but it will certainly make the cat less happy.

In any case, he has things to do this evening, and it’s time to start thinking about doing them.

On the beach below, right on cue, John emerges from the water, gloriously nude.  (And he may be casual about his own body, but he _is_ glorious: sun-browned, sleek and muscular, his silvered hair glinting in the sun.)  He stretches languorously—and is nearly bowled off his feet by eighty pounds of enthusiastic wet dog cannoning against his thighs.

He drops to one knee to contain Perdita, who squirms under his petting hands for a few seconds before dancing back a few steps to shake the water from her fur.  John’s hands fly up to shield his face from the spray (undoubtedly a lost cause).  The sea breeze carries his laughter up to Harold, who smiles fondly.

He’ll never tire of hearing John laugh.

After some affectionate wrestling, John gets to his feet, brushes off the sand, and heads up to the house with Perdita at his heels.  Harold meets them with two towels as they troop onto the porch, a wet dog being humorous on the beach but unacceptable indoors.

John takes the towels in one hand and cups Harold’s skull with the other, leaning down for a salty kiss.  A few drops of water fall from his hair onto Harold’s forehead as the tip of his tongue teases Harold’s lips, entreating entry but then withdrawing, until Harold loses patience and thrusts his own tongue into John’s mouth.  John sucks him in with a smug grunt and goes pliant—though he’s still holding Harold in position—allowing Harold to kiss him as long and as deeply as he pleases.

“Good swim?” Harold asks, when they finally separate.  If he’s a little breathless, well, he has excellent reason.

“Mmhm.  You’re coming in with me next time, Harold.”

“We’ll see.”

“You need your exercise, too.”  John’s fingers brush over Harold’s creaky hip, to the surgical scar across his abdomen, allowing the concern to show in his eyes as he raises an inquiring eyebrow.

“I’m fine, truly,” Harold reassures him.  “I just got distracted.  Energyne goes public next week, and I needed to make sure—”

“The world will still need saving tomorrow, Harold,” John chides.

“Grace and Angelo will be here tomorrow,” Harold counters.  “I wanted to get things to a point where I could abandon them for a few days while I play host.”

“Uh huh.  Guess I’d better confiscate your laptop for the duration?”

“Please.  I hope you have more faith in my good manners than that.”

“I have all kinds of faith in you, Harold,” says John, abruptly solemn.  Then, just as quickly, he’s back to teasing.  “But why leave that kind of temptation lying around?”

Harold _harumphs_ , to which John responds by ruffling Harold’s hair much like he did to Perdita earlier.

“I don’t know how you can talk with a straight face about shielding me from temptation while you’re standing there like _that_ ,” Harold grumbles, for the pleasure of seeing John’s cheeks flush pink under his tan.  John is supremely comfortable in his own skin, unselfconscious about parading around naked in front of Harold—or a team of gunmen or the Queen of England, should either burst through the door.  But a simple compliment from Harold still has the power to discomfit him.

Before he can retort with something self-deprecating and/or insulting about how he compares to the computer in Harold’s esteem, Harold runs both hands up John’s chest and down to settle on his hips.  John bites his lower lip and allows Harold to touch, to look. . .to admire.  And there is much to admire.  John’s body makes Harold wish for Grace’s painter’s eye and hands, so that he could capture the fine proportions, the breadth of shoulder and play of muscle, the expressive eyes, the wry mouth—and yes, the scars that testify to John’s violent history, and to his survival.  Unlike Harold, who still struggles to make peace with his own scars, John doesn’t seem to care much one way or the other about his, and Harold doesn’t fuss over them.  They’re part of John, that’s all, like the grizzled hairs curling over his breastbone and below his navel—or the red-flushed penis beginning to arch hopefully upwards in response to Harold’s caresses.

“However,” Harold murmurs, “The fact remains that we have guests arriving on the evening ferry, and while I’m sure they would appreciate this fine display of male physique, it’s generally considered good etiquette to dress for dinner.”

With a last caress of John’s hipbones, Harold releases him and steps back, pleased at the slightly dazed look in his eyes, not to mention that half-mast erection.  Tempting, indeed—but they really do need to get ready for company.

John shakes his head in a restrained echo of Perdita’s earlier behavior and turns away to riffle through the mail on the table.  Just to prove that he does, indeed, have some measure of impulse control, Harold refrains from patting him on the ass.

John plucks the most interesting missive from the pile: a postcard illustrated with a cartoon of Charlie Brown showing Snoopy a leash, captioned, _Love is walking the dog_.  It’s directed to _A Boy and his Dog_ at their post office box.  There’s no message on the back, and the postmark is from Minneapolis, although its true point of origin was undoubtedly Manhattan.

A frown creases John’s brows as he inspects the card, but no matter how carefully Harold scrutinizes, he detects only thoughtfulness.  No sign of restlessness or regret.  Not that he suspects John of hiding anything from him, but it would be only natural if he felt a touch of. . .ambivalence. . .

“Which one of us is she insulting?” John wonders aloud.  “Or this supposed to be an update on Bear?”

Harold shakes his head.  “Honestly, I’m surprised she would associate herself with such a sentimental. . .sentiment, even in the service of sarcasm.  But I’m glad to know she’s—”

“Still kicking ass and taking names?”

“In her own inimitable style.”

The corner of John’s mouth quirks with fond amusement.  He drops the card negligently back on the table.

“C’mon,” he says.  “We’d better get dressed and get cooking.”

Harold turns to pick up his computer, but John halts him by cupping his face in both hands (careful of Harold’s neck, as always, such a delicate touch for such powerful hands), and gives him one last, deep kiss that makes Harold’s own penis twitch in his trousers.  Then he presses one towel into Harold’s hands, wraps the other casually around his hips, and saunters inside, leaving Harold to rub down the soggy, wriggling dog as best he can.

When Perdita is as dry as she’s reasonably going to get, he levers himself to his feet with a small groan (John is, of course, correct about his need for regular exercise and stretching). 

As he goes to close up shop on the computer, it pings to announce a new email message.  It might be from Grace, warning him of a change in plans, he rationalizes as he reflexively brings it up.

It isn’t from Grace.  The sender field claims it’s from _bluebird-of-happiness_ , no domain name.  Indeed, no metadata whatsoever.

The body reads: _Happy Birthday <3._

It isn’t Harold’s birthday.  Neither the actual anniversary of his birth, nor the birthdate listed on his current IDs.  It’s November 17th, one year to the day since he stood on a Manhattan rooftop watching John die.

There’s no camera watching him.  The house has no security systems of any kind, no internet-of-things gadgets, and Harold has systematically removed or disabled all the cameras built into their computers, phones, and other electronics.  Still, he reflexively whispers, “Thank you,” to the unseeing screen.  

He’ll mention it to John later tonight, when they’re alone in their bedroom.  But just now, there are showers to take and dinner to cook and guests to welcome.  He closes the laptop, tucks it firmly under his arm, and limps indoors, whistling the finale from _Iolanthe._


End file.
